My general thought reading about the WSO was if he was as suggested the Squadron CO/XO and by tradition, CO/XOs tend to be crewed with the least experienced junior officer in the squadron for good reasons. All of us know this from own experiences. If he was a bird Colonel than he would probably be flying with a much more experienced pilot as a Wing Commander, but as a Skipper probably not that experienced. Considering the post mishap discussion and even the President indicated they were downed by a should fired weapon, if he was a newer pilot that lack of experience may have played role in not being able to avoid the missile. mgb From: Stephen Bury <sbury@erols.com> Sent: Monday, April 6, 2026 2:20 PM To: Kevin Black <kblack1967@gmail.com> Cc: helobubbas@helobubbas.com Subject: [Helobubbas] Re: WSO was a Colonel My guess is the WSO is most likely the current Squadron Commander who is a lieutenant colonel and who was highly decorated last year . It's not uncommon for the Skipper to be referred to as Colonel in that position... Just my thoughts... And purposely not naming the name. On Apr 6, 2026 4:24 PM, Kevin Black <kblack1967@gmail.com <mailto:kblack1967@gmail.com> > wrote: In my past readings, I seem to recall a ban somewhere in the later stages of Vietnam where O-6 and above were prohibited from flying combat missions due to the loss rate and costs and intel risks of losing a senior officer into a POW camp. If the guy is running the wing and not flying as much as the majority, his skillset probably isn't what it was when he was an 0-3/0-4. Could this have hindered his usage of defensive measures and possibly contributed to getting shot down? Or cockpit rank gradient? It's a thing and there is a risk associated with those things. It sounds like we lost a fortune in equipment during this effort and it wasn't a seamless operation. I suspect we will get a movie out of this someday with such a rich story and events to work from. Apparently someone leaked that this guy was missing and the government is after the leaker now. The media is never a trustworthy ally and that goes back since forever. Probably contributed to some of the problems encountered and certainly raised the risks. On 4/5/2026 9:18 PM, Michael G. Brattland wrote: Probably Wing Commander. Wonder how junior the pilot crewed with him was. MGBrattland Sent via the Samsung Galaxy S23 5G, an AT&T 5G smartphone _______________________________________________ Helobubbas mailing list -- helobubbas@helobubbas.com <mailto:helobubbas@helobubbas.com> To unsubscribe send an email to helobubbas-leave@helobubbas.com <mailto:helobubbas-leave@helobubbas.com>